Page 112 of Can't Stop Watching
I surface from darkness by degrees. Floating in a void, then swimming up through gray fog toward consciousness. Pain greets me like an old friend, sharp, intimate, familiar. Hospitalshave a smell you never forget. Antiseptic over blood. Bleach over death.
I'm alive. That's the first surprise.
Something warm presses against my right arm. My eyelids weigh a thousand pounds, but I force them open, blinking against harsh fluorescent lighting. The world's blurry at first: white ceiling, beeping machines, tubes running from my arm.
Then Lila comes into focus, and everything else fades to background noise.
She's asleep, half-collapsed against my bed, auburn hair spilled across the white sheets. Dark circles under her eyes tell me she's been here awhile. Her hand loosely clutches mine even in sleep.
The sight of her hits harder than the bullets did.
I flex my left hand, finding it wrapped in a sling, shoulder throbbing in dull waves beneath bandages. Right hand seems operational though. I lift it slowly, muscles protesting after disuse, and brush my fingertips across her cheek.
Soft. Warm.
Alive.
"You're so strong," I whisper, voice a sandpaper rasp.
She fought Langford, didn't buckle. Stood her ground and won. Drove a fucking pen into his neck while I was so many steps behind.
Her eyelashes flutter against my touch. I should pull back, let her sleep, but I'm selfish. I need to see those green eyes, need confirmation that we both made it through.
I trace the line of her cheek with my thumb, drinking in the sight of her. When she stirs, her eyes flutter open, confusion giving way to shock.
"Dane?" Her voice cracks. "Oh my God, you're awake."
She sits bolt upright, immediately alert. Relief washes across her features, but something else lurks behind it, something guarded, distant. Like she's built a wall while I was under.
"Hey." The words scrape out of my throat. "Miss me?"
Her face does a complicated dance between joy and something darker. She reaches for the water cup, holds the straw to my lips. I drink, wondering what's changed behind her beautiful gaze.
"Three days," she says, answering the question I didn't ask. "You've been out for three days. They weren't sure..." She swallows hard. "One bullets in your shoulder, your thigh, your side. You lost a lot of blood."
"Claire?" I have to know what happened.
"Gone. The police thinks she fled the country." Lila's voice is clinical, detached. "They found Sarah Keller's body in a cold room on the same floor. And six others. They kept them as some sort of trophies."
"Shit. That's messed up."
I process this with the cold calculation my training installed. Seven dead. Claire in the wind. The math doesn't balance.
"You okay?" I ask, though I can see the answer. She's not.
"I killed someone, Dane." Her voice is flat. "I stuck a pen in his throat and watched him die."
The distance makes sense now. Some people, when they first kill, it breaks something fundamental. Reshapes their understanding of what they're capable of. I've seen it happen to stronger people than me.
"You did what you had to do," I say, though I know platitudes don't help. Death leaves fingerprints on your soul that no amount of justification can wash away.
"I know." Her eyes meet mine, but they're somewhere far away. "The funny thing is, I don't feel guilty. I feel... nothing. Is that normal?"
I want to tell her it'll come later—the nightmares, the replays, the crushing weight—but maybe she'll be one of the lucky ones. Maybe she won't carry it like I do.
"There's no normal," I say instead. "Just before and after."
Lila nods, her gaze dropping to where our hands meet on the hospital sheet. Something changes in her posture, a subtle withdrawal that speaks volumes. She pulls her hands away.
